"Fellow"-ship of the Ring: No Girls Allowed!
Max B.

In regards to the inclusion of females in the movie and the strengthening of their roles...I've looked at the arguments against it and they seem to be nothing more than excuses for being elitist and purist.

To use Daria S. (below) as an isolated example: Daria makes the (correct) statement that LOTR is not just "beauty" but "high beauty"...and then goes on to draw an analogy to the piece of trash that was Armageddon! How these two movies, their creative merits and audience reaction could be compared is beyond me. They could have put a talking aardvark in charge of the mission in that movie and nobody would care since Armageddon is hardly worth the bother.

Now, while I agree that the inclusion of  gratuitous romantic melodrama is a sickening idea...the idea of her being the teary "maiden in waiting" presented in the same post is also highly insulting and equally as obscene and no less melodramatic and low brow.

Tolkien wrote works that reflected thoughts of society at the time, and while it is a great technological and mythical piece, it does hold very male dominated and slightly racist early 20th century view. Simply put, any work and interpretation of previous work should take into account its society and culture of the time. I'm sure if Tolkien had written the book today, he would have taken that into consideration.

Does anyone truly believe that what Tolkien " really meant in his writing" will be fouled by the presence of a strong female character? So far, the movie seems to bringing all the important ideas and concepts to the screen and audiences everywhere. Maybe I misread Tolkien, I thought his themes and ideas were far greater than "present but relatively passive" women.